A blog by Geert van der Cruijsen on Apps, Cloud & ALM

Category: DevOps
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Last week I’ve created 2 posts on setting up VSTS and Hockeyapp in a continuous deployment scenario for both Xamarin.Android and Windows 10 UWP apps. Today we’ll discuss the 3rd platform: Apps built using Xamarin.iOS

To make things easier during automated build I’ve also created a new solution that only contains the projects relevant for the iOS app.

This solution only contains the PCL project and the Xamarin.iOS app project.

Setting up the build in VSTS: Prerequisites

There are some difficulties comparing the build of iOS apps to Android or Windows apps. first difficulty is that you are going to need a Mac to do the actual build steps. to do this you have 2 options. The first is to just use a Mac within your network and use that as a build agent, the other option is to use a service called MacInCloud.com which has a special plan for VSTS build agents.

Mac Build agent

Mac in cloud has a special VSTS build agent plan which only costs 30$ a month. in my experience this works really well. If you have a spare Mac somewhere to use as build agent this would also work fine but most clients I come don’t have that

After we’ve arranged a mac build agent and set up the app certificates we can actually start building our app.

Setting up the build in VSTS

in VSTS open your team project and go to the BUILD tab. in here we’re going to create a new build definition by clicking the green + sign.

Choose the Xamarin.iOS build template to set up the build.

In the next step select the correct repository you want to use for your app and make sure you select the Mac build agent in the drop down box.

Click Create and now our build definition is created with 2 out of the box steps. The first step is doing the actual Xamarin.iOS build. select the iOS specific solution so only the iOS related projects are build.

We’ll be removing the Xamarin test cloud step for now. if you want to know more about this let me know in a comment so I can create a new blogpost about this if people would like that.

so we only have the Xamarion.iOS step left but this will only build our app. we’re also going to need 2 extra steps which are not part of the Xamarin.iOS step:

Nuget package restore

Copy and Publish Artifacts.

Nuget Package restore:

I’ve you’ve read my previous posts on Android and Windows UWP you would expect we’re going to use the out of the box “restore nuget package” build step. But that is not possible for iOS. Why not? these steps are implemented using Powershell which doesn’t run on your mac agent. so we’ll have to do it manually by executing a shell script. So we’re going to create a shell script task. First we need to create the actual script. The script is quite simple. download the nuget.exe file and execute the nuget restore command

Save the .sh file in your repository so we can add it to our build step. Click the green + and select “Shell Script”

Drag the .sh script to the top of the build so the nuget restore will be executed before the actual build step. Select your .sh file in the script path and as argumenets pass in the path to your iOS solution file so the script knows what packages to restore.

Copy and Publish Artifacts

So we’ve set up the nuget restore and the build. the last step of our build is to copy and publish the build artificats so we can send these to Hockeyapp later.

In the copy and publish step set the root to the correct folder and for contents we’re going to select the .ipa file. The Artifact name we’re naming “drop” of type server.

These 3 steps should together be able to do a successful build. Go to triggers to schedule your build nightly or set it to build every time someone checks in code.

Queue a build to see if everything works.

Setting up Hockeyapp

I assume you’ve already created an account at Hockeyapp otherwise just sign up at www.hockeyapp.net (It’s free for 2 apps or less) once you’ve logged in go and create your first app by pressing the New App Button

Hockeyapp will ask you to upload a build. we’re not going to do that since we’re setting up automatic deployments. choose to add the app manually

Choose iOS as the platform and fill in your release type and title of the app.

Click Save and in the overview of the app copy and save the App ID

To be able to deploy from VSTS we need to set up an API token we can use in VSTS. If you already followed the Android or Windows UWP guide you might have already taken these steps so you can skip these steps and move to the chapter of deploying the app.

Click on your user icon in the top right and select API Tokens from the menu on the left.

Create a new API token and call it VSTS. Copy this API token. we’ll need it in VSTS

Move back to VSTS and open up the marketplace (top right next to your name) and click manage extensions. browse the marketplace and install the Hockeyapp extension

After installing the extension go back to your VSTS team project and navigate to the settings window. in the settings menu go to Services and add a new service Endpoint of type “Hockeyapp”

Give the endpoint a proper name and copy in the API token you’ve generated earlier. now save the service endpoint.

Now all the plumbing with Hockeyapp is done we can actually start deploying our app to hockeyapp

Deploying your automated build to Hockeyapp

Go back to your team project in VSTS and navigate to the Release tab

Choose an Empty deployment template and press OK.

First go to the Artifact tab and select the build we’ve created earlier as supplier of the artifacts we’re going to release to hockeyapp.

Go back to Environments, name your deployment template and add a new Task

This list should now contain a Hockeyapp step since we installed that as our extension

Configure the Hockeyapp step by selecting the Hockeyapp connection from the list. (the service connection you’ve created earlier should be listed here) Enter the APP ID you copied earlier and select the .ipa file that was generated by the build.

That’s all it takes to set up the release. for the final step we’re going to set the triggers in the “Triggers” tab of the release to be deployed continuously after each build.

Press the Green + To start a manual release towards Hockeyapp. Everything should work and the release should be created in Hockeyapp.

If you have any questions let me know via twitter @geertvdc or by commenting below.

The basic process of setting up the continuous deployments is the same for all platforms: first build the sources, create a release and send that to Hockeyapp. However building the UWP app and sending it to hockey app require a few steps that aren’t so obvious. so lets start deploying

This solution is checked into my GIT repository stored in VSTS so lets move to there to start building the UWP app today. please note that this also works for regular UWP apps that do not have any Xamarin involvement. it’s actually easiest to create a new solution containing only your class libraries (can be PCL) and your UWP project leaving out the Android and iOS specific projects (if you have any)

Setting up the build in VSTS

in VSTS open your team project and go to the BUILD tab. in here we’re going to create a new build definition by clicking the green + sign.

Choose the Universal Windows Platform build template and click next.

Select the repository containing the solution and select the branch you want to deploy. you can even choose to build apps that are stored in different sources such as GitHub or remote Git repositories.

After everything is set click on Create

A build definition will be created and several build steps are generated for you. We’ll go over them one by one.

but first we need to set some other things up. UWP apps can run on both Mobile devices and tablets or pc’s. this will need different builds focussing on either ARM or the x86 architecture. We’ll set up 1 build definition that will handle both.

To make sure the build runs for each platform we go into the options tab of our build definition and select “Multi-configuration”. set the multipliers to “BuildPlatform” so the build will run for each different build platform we select.

Next go to the “Variables” tab and set the “BuildPlatform” variable to both x86 as ARM

Back to the build steps. We’ll start with restoring all nuget packages. this step was automatically generated and we only need to set the correct solution. set this to the .sln file that only contains the UWP related projects.

Next step is building the projects in the Visual Studio build step that is already created for us. Set the solution to the solution containing the UWP projects and set the platform to the $(BuildPlatform) variable

If you’ve read the Xamarin Android guide as well you might expect what is the next step: publishing the artifacts. but here is when Windows 10 UWP apps start to be different from the Xamarin Android guide.

Hockeyapp does not have any option to upload .appxbundles that contain both ARM ad x86 sources. we need to split them up into 2 packages and then send them to Hockeyapp separately. for Windows 10 Mobile we can still upload an .appxbundle file but for Windows 10 tablet/desktop (x86) we need to send a .zip file containing the .appxbundle, the .cer file and the .ps1 file to install the app on the pc or tablet (installing is currently still manually running the .ps1 file for Windows 10. I hope and expect this will become better in the near future.

To be able to publish both the artifacts: .appxbundle as the zip file we need to remove the predefined step called “publish build artifacts” and replace it with another. We’ll also be removing the “Index sources & publish symbols” step.

Now it’s time to add 3 new steps. 2 powershell tasks (1 at the top of the build and 1 at the bottom) and after that a “copy and publish build artifacts”

Wait! Powershell? You would expect for Windows 10 UWP that everything would work out of the box. Well it isn’t currently so we have to do some parts manually.

The First powershell script we will add to the top will increase the version number of the Windows package to a unique number so Hockeyapp will understand new incoming versions. The version number always contains 4 digits:X.X.X.X where I would like to keep the first 3 digits up to the development team to clearly define their releases. the last digit we’re going to use for our release number. This version number is stored within an XML file in the project so we’ll open it, increase the number and save it so the build will use this new number. We’ll insert the BuildID as the last number since this is a unique number and an integer.

You’ll need to store the powershell code below in a .ps1 file and store it somewhere in your repository.

to make it easier I’ve already created all 3 powershell scripts you are going to need during this guide and stored them on Github. so you can also download them from there so you always have the newest version. Check them in to your own repository so you can use them in the powershell task.

In the powershell step select the UpdateAppVersion.ps1 and for arguments make sure you set 2 parameters. –projectFolder pointing at the directory where your AppxPackages will be created and the –buildId that points to $(Build.BuildId) So now this powershell script will change to build number and the Visual studio Build step will take this number into account and will version your appxpackage folder. next step is to create a .zip file of Appxpackage directory. again with powershell. ZipAppxPackage.ps1Select the ZipAppxPackage.ps1 as the script filename and pass a parameter called –dir to the script that has $(Build.BinariesDirectory) as its value.

so now everything is build and zipped and we can send it to the drop folder. our last step of the build.

Set the copy root to the $(Build.BinariesDirectory)\ and set the contents to copy to both *.zip files as *arm*.appxBundle files. The artifact name and type are set to drop and Server.

This was the final step of our build. you can run the app and everything should work. on to the next step: deploying to Hockeyapp

Setting up Hockeyapp

I assume you’ve already created an account at Hockeyapp otherwise just sign up at www.hockeyapp.net (It’s free for 2 apps or less) once you’ve logged in go and create your first app by pressing the New App Button

Hockeyapp will ask you to upload a build. we’re not going to do that since we’re setting up automatic deployments. choose to add the app manually

Choose Windows as a platform and fill in your release type and title of the app. Note that this is only the tablet/pc (x86) release of the app and not the ARM version.

Repeat the steps above for the Windows 10 mobile (ARM) version but then select Windows Phone as plataform

Copy the AppID of both apps and save them:

To be able to deploy from VSTS we need to set up an API token we can use in VSTS. If you already followed the Android guide you might have already taken these steps so you can skip these steps and move to the chapter of deploying the app.

Click on your user icon in the top right and select API Tokens from the menu on the left.

Create a new API token and call it VSTS. Copy this API token. we’ll need it in VSTS

Move back to VSTS and open up the marketplace (top right next to your name) and click manage extensions. browse the marketplace and install the Hockeyapp extension

After installing the extension go back to your VSTS team project and navigate to the settings window. in the settings menu go to Services and add a new service Endpoint of type “Hockeyapp”

Give the endpoint a proper name and copy in the API token you’ve generated earlier. now save the service endpoint.

Now all the plumbing with Hockeyapp is done we can actually start deploying our app to hockeyapp

Deploying your automated build to Hockeyapp

Go back to your team project in VSTS and navigate to the Release tab

Choose an Empty deployment template and press OK.

First go to the Artifact tab and select the build we’ve created earlier as supplier of the artifacts we’re going to release to hockeyapp.

Go back to Environments, name your deployment template and add a new Task

This list should now contain a Hockeyapp step since we installed that as our extension

This hockeyapp step will only work for Windows 10 Mobile (phone) and not for the pc/tablet (x86) version because sending .zip files is not supported by this step. we’ll cover this again by a custom powershell script.

Update: Hockeyapp made some changes to the Hockeyapp step in our deployment script so it can be used for both Windows 10 Mobile and Windows 10 Desktop/Tablet (x86/x64)

Windows 10 Mobile

To set up the hockeyapp step select the Hockeyapp connection you’ve set up earlier and enter your App ID. for the binary file path click on the … and select your ARM.appxbundle file

This step should do the trick. Schedule a release and you should be able to see a new version pop up in Hockeyapp.

Windows 10 (x86) Tablet/PC

For the Windows 10 (x86/x64) Tablet/PC version of the app we can now also use the hockey app build step so add another task of type Hockeyapp but let this one point to the other App ID for the Windows 10 desktop/tablet app and as Binary File path select the Zip file we created during the build instead of the appxbundle. Hockeyapp will see if there is already a version created and otherwise it will create a new version and upload it.

Now save the release definition and test it. press the green + to create a new release to see if everything works. if everything works fine go to triggers and set the build to continuous deployments so it will fire every time a new build is created.

Hopefully this guide helps you into creating higher quality apps and will save you time by not having to manually create releases all the time.

If you have any questions contact me on twitter @geertvdc or leave a comment below.

Continuous integration and continuous deployments are a hot topic in the web world and are becoming a common practice there. In the mobile world however this is not the case “yet”.

Microsoft seems to have everything in place now for a full Mobile ALM suite. Building your cross platform apps with Xamarin (which they just acquired yesterday), storing your code and builds in VSTS (Visual Studio Team Services) and deploying your app to Hockeyapp. Usage and bug tracking can be done by either Xamarin insights, Hockeyapp or Microsoft Application insights (although the last one is deprecated). In the end I believe these 3 applications will merge into 1. So how do we set up these continuous deployments of our apps to hockeyapp? I’ll be describing this in a series of 3 blogposts (1 for each platform).

Context: the app we are going to deploy

This solution is checked into my GIT repository stored in VSTS so lets move to there to start building the Android

Setting up the build in VSTS

in VSTS open your team project and go to the BUILD tab. in here we’re going to create a new build definition by clicking the green + sign.

Select the Xamarin.Android template which is already created by Microsoft for you.

Select the repository containing the solution and select the branch you want to deploy. you can even choose to build apps that are stored in different sources such as GitHub or remote Git repositories.

After everything is set click on Create

A build definition will be created and several build steps are generated for you. We’ll go over them one by one.

The first step is setting up your Xamarin license steps that will activate and deactivate your Xamarin license which is needed to execute the build of your Xamarin.Android project.

In this step you have to enter your email and password. Please note that the password field is a plain textbox and no password box. to fix this go to the “Variables” tab and create a variable with your password while you check the lock icon on the right. now you can store your password without other people being able to see it.

After you’ve created the Variable enter your email address and password variable into the 2 Xamarin License Steps (1 for activation and 1 for deactivation)

Please note that the deactivation step is set to always run (even if the build crashes half way)

Next we’ll be removing the Xamarin Test cloud build step in our build. Xamarin test cloud is a very nice tool to test your app on real devices but for this blogpost it’s a bit off topic. if you want to know more about how this works let me know and I’ll write another blog post about it.

I’ll also be deleting the MSBuild step that would build the unit test projects since my sample project did not have any unit tests.

Now the Xamarin license is set up we will start building the actual Android app. to do this we first need to build the PCL project. Add 2 extra build steps to our build definition by pressing the Add Build Step button

First Add a Nuget Installer step.

after that add a Visual Studio Build step.

Drag both steps to the top so the Nuget Installer is the first step and the Visual Studio Build step is the second.

The nuget installer step will be configured so it will install and update all nuget packages that are part of our solution. select your solution file in the “Path to Solution” field.

This is all we have to set up for the nuget packages. If you don’t have any nuget packages (is that possible these days?) you can remove this build step.

Next we’re going to set up the build of the PCL project. select the Visual Studio Build Step and select all the csproj file(s) that are part of your project.

Set the build platform to AnyCPU and make sure the configuration takes the $(BuildConfiguration) variable.

So now the PCL project builds lets move to the actual Android App build step.

Select your Android csproj file and make sure that the output directory is set to $(build.binariesdirectory)\$(BuildConfiguration) and the Configuration is set to $(BuildConfiguration)

Now all projects are being built and the only thing we need to do is publish the build artifacts so we can deploy them to Hockeyapp.

Set the Path to publish to $(build.binariesdirectory)\$(BuildConfiguration) and set the Artifact name to drop and the artifact type to Server.

Save your build and give it a test spin by clicking “Queue Build” you can also set the build to run automatically by adding a trigger in the Triggers tab.

if all is correct your build should now pass. on to the next step deploying a release to Hockeyapp!

Setting up Hockeyapp

I assume you’ve already created an account at Hockeyapp otherwise just sign up at www.hockeyapp.net (It’s free for 2 apps or less) once you’ve logged in go and create your first app by pressing the New App Button

Hockeyapp will ask you to upload a build. we’re not going to do that since we’re setting up automatic deployments. choose to add the app manually

Choose Android as your platform and select Alpha or Beta for release type. (whatever fits your app builds best). Give the app a title and fill in the Package Name and click save.

Now the app is created and it will show up on your dashboard. click on your app and copy your App ID. we’ll need it later.

To be able to deploy from VSTS we need to set up an API token we can use in VSTS. Click on your user icon in the top right and select API Tokens from the menu on the left.

Create a new API token and call it VSTS. Copy this API token. we’ll need it in VSTS

Move back to VSTS and open up the marketplace (top right next to your name) and click manage extensions. browse the marketplace and install the Hockeyapp extension

After installing the extension go back to your VSTS team project and navigate to the settings window. in the settings menu go to Services and add a new service Endpoint of type “Hockeyapp”

Give the endpoint a proper name and copy in the API token you’ve generated earlier. now save the service endpoint.

Now all the plumbing with Hockeyapp is done we can actually start deploying our app to hockeyapp

Deploying your automated build to Hockeyapp

Go back to your team project in VSTS and navigate to the Release tab

Choose an Empty deployment template and press OK.

First go to the Artifact tab and select the build we’ve created earlier as supplier of the artifacts we’re going to release to hockeyapp.

Go back to Environments, name your deployment template and add a new Task

This list should now contain a Hockeyapp step since we installed that as our extension

Configure the Hockeyapp step by selecting the Hockeyapp connection from the list. (the service connection you’ve created earlier should be listed here) Enter the APP ID you copied earlier and select the .apk file that was generated by the build.

The last step is setting the trigger to automatically start your hockeyapp deployment after each successful build. go to triggers, select Continuous deployment and make sure that the environment trigger is set to “Automated: after release creation.”

Save the deployment template and now you are ready to go. you can now manually create a new release using the deployment template or start a new build and you should see your app show up in Hockeyapp so your testers can download the app.

If you have any questions let me know via twitter @geertvdc or by commenting below.

Hopefully you’ll be back tomorrow for the next post explaining all the steps for Windows 10 UWP apps.

About

This is a personal blog by Geert van der Cruijsen: Geert is a technical expert and architect on mobile and cloud technology based on the Microsoft stack. Geert has implemented enterprise mobility solutions and apps at several companies in the Netherlands and abroad. Geert is also an active co-organizer and speaker for several mobile developer communities.

Geert works as a Lead Consultant at Xpirit in the Netherlands. At Xpirit Geert helps Xpirit's customer with their Mobile strategy and vision from defining the right mobile moments to Xamarin expertise or setting up mobile development factory or mobile center of excellences. Geert is an expert on the full Mobile application development lifecycle.

Geert also works as a Xamarin Partner trainer doing class room Xamarin training for Xamarin University

This blog will focus on everything related to digital mobility from mobile app development tips using Xamarin, Android, iOS & Windows 10 to topics related to Microsoft Azure and ALM.